


Reflect

by brumalbreeze



Category: Twisted-Wonderland (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, M/M, Stream of Consciousness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:28:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26215663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brumalbreeze/pseuds/brumalbreeze
Summary: He was trying to run away again,but Trey wasn’t going to allow him to escape this time.He wasn’t going to let this keep happening.(Stream of consciousness TreyCater, focusing on Trey's refusal to back down and let Cater run away. Companion piece toStill.)
Relationships: Trey Clover/Cater Diamond
Comments: 3
Kudos: 50





	Reflect

**Author's Note:**

> I knew before I even finished writing [_Still_](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26191756) that I wanted to write the same story from Trey's POV, so here we are. I'm... still drowning in Traitor (TreyCater) feelings, to absolutely nobody's surprise. :'-)

“Cater.”

His breath caught in his chest.

“I like you.”

“… Huh?”

Cater looked at him with fear in his eyes, and a sour taste seeped into Trey’s mouth.

His chest clenched as he watched the color drain from Cater’s face and his entire body stiffen, as if bracing for something terrible. But the next moment, Cater grinned at him with a smile so perfect and wide, it pulled his mouth until his canine teeth flashed at him.

“What? Are you trying to confess or something? Haha! I think you might’ve gotten the wrong person, Trey-kun!”

Even though Cater was looking straight at him, it didn’t feel like he was there. How could they be so close—only half an arm’s length away—but so distant and forlorn?

“I haven’t,” he said and held Cater’s gaze firmly.

The green eyes he stared into trembled, thin leaves quivering above an unbroken lake.

For more than two years, Trey had waited and watched. Quietly and unobtrusively, he stood on the outside of Cater’s impenetrable wall, only occasionally laying his hand against the cold surface and hoping it would come down.

And it did.

Slowly.

Because Cater finally showed camera flash glimpses of himself between his half-truths and half-jokes, through uncertain smiles that cracked like glaze, and trembling breaths which prefaced his words. And when Trey peered into the gauzy mist that Cater shrouded himself in, he sometimes—barely—was able to see him.

Cater Diamond.

And nobody else.

Yet it was never enough because, every time he took a step too close, Cater shrank back and built his wall up again.

But Trey was done pretending he didn’t notice. In the back of his mind, he knew that, if he let Cater slip away this time, he would never be able stand this close to him again.

Almost immediately, Cater looked away. “Aah… Of course you do!”

He was trying to run away again,

but Trey wasn’t going to allow him to escape this time.

He wasn’t going to let this keep happening.

“I mean, who wouldn’t like me, right? I get you, but you don’t have to go out of your way to tell me or anything. Anyway, I—”

Trey reached out and grabbed him by the wrist. “You know that’s not what I meant.”

And just as Cater’s smile splintered and broke into sob, so did Trey’s heart.

He wished he knew how to let Cater know he didn’t have to keep pretending to be someone he thought everyone wanted him to be. That he didn’t have to hide and cover up the parts of himself he believed were imperfect. That he could be loved and accepted if only he allowed others to do so.

But what could he say when Cater lifted his free arm and blocked off his face, only allowing Trey to see the grin he was forcing himself to make?

“You’re only saying that because you don’t know how annoying I am. And how clingy and whiny and petty. And how fake and empty I really am.”

In reality, Trey knew better than anyone else exactly what Cater was like.

He knew how hard Cater worked when he had to, how much of himself he sacrificed to make others happy, how much he cared, hurt, feared, and wanted. No one was harsher on Cater than himself, and Trey knew all this.

They didn’t spend the past two years and some months almost constantly by each other’s sides for Trey not to have noticed how Cater acted when he thought no one was looking. Only in the too-early mornings of the day would “Cater Diamond” grumble and slap away any hands that tried to wake him up. Only in the orange-gold evenings in the empty hallways would “Cater Diamond” sigh, slump his shoulders, and allow himself to breathe. Only in the deep shadows of quiet nights would the glow of his cell phone light up the face of “Cater Diamond,” who was tired and empty and sad.

And every version of Cater Diamond was still him. Whether he was laughing at some joke, taking fifty different pictures of the same cake from twenty different angles, humming along to his favorite band’s song, begging Trey to help him with his homework, curled up in bed and scrolling mindlessly on his phone, or holding his breath and pretending not to exist—he was still Cater Diamond.

“Cater,” he called out but received no response.

Trey gingerly reached up and pried Cater’s arm from his face. Thankfully, he allowed him to do so without resisting.

Cater’s eyes were red and puffy, and tears fell ceaselessly from them even as he looked up at him. Trey wanted to cry too, not only because it hurt him to see Cater in so much pain, but because of how beautiful and raw he looked.

He blinked hard and swallowed the heat that made his throat feel tight. Never before had Trey seen Cater so open and vulnerable. He was almost afraid Cater would break.

So he placed his hand against Cater’s face and caressed his wet cheek, just to make sure he wouldn’t. The red diamond suit on his skin smudged and disappeared under his thumb, but Cater didn’t.

The way he looked at him, still afraid and uncertain, still seeking some shred of reassurance, and still there and hopeful…

He kissed Cater on the forehead, hoping the simple gesture could convey even a hundredth of the feelings he had for him.

“I know,” he said, hugging him close to his chest.

_I know every part of you, even the parts of yourself you don’t know._

“I know,” Trey repeated, “and I still like you. Every part of you.”

Truthfully, he didn’t know if he was enough. Cater was so fragile and uncertain and too good for Trey. He deserved so much. The world. No, more than that. So much more than that.

But Trey was greedy, and he wanted Cater all to himself.

Maybe one day, Cater would try to run away again. Laugh and wink and pretend it was all a joke. Clap his hands together and bow his head in an airy apology. Wave him off like it was nothing important.

“Trey-kun…”

His voice was like glassy, crystallized sugar, and Trey held him tighter when he felt Cater return his embrace.

But even if that day ever came, Trey would do his best to keep him still, keep him there, keep him his.

“Cater… I love you.”

**Author's Note:**

> I just... want these two to be happy... Why must they be filled with so much pain... /coughs out blood
> 
> Anyway. You can find me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/algidwind/), suffering, RT'ing all the Traitor and DeuAce stuff I lay my eyes on, and very occasionally translating things. Such as the most recent Wish Upon a Star event.
> 
> (Here are my translations for the [main event episodes](https://twitter.com/algidwind/status/1299308943013892096?s=20) and the [side stories](https://twitter.com/algidwind/status/1299669179306450948?s=20).)
> 
> Hope you liked this!


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